One of most annoying aspects of dealing with incoming email is spam mail (unsolicited email). It fills up your email box, takes up your precious time, and seems to only get worse. You may even delete your personal or business email that was mistaken for spam mail.

This could result in lost business to you.

In Part 2 of this article you will discover solutions to help you stop spam mail. This allows you to spend more time building a profitable business.

Apart from just hitting delete button each day here are some timesaving solutions:

1. Use filters or message rules of your email client.

a) In outlook express (since it is most popular email client) go to tools - message rules - mail - mail rules - new

b) Under "select conditions for your rule", check "where subject line contains specific words".

c) Under "select actions for your rule" check "delete it".

d) Under "rule description" click on "contains specific words" - enter words or phrases that you never wish to receive again.

e) Under "name of rule" provide an appropriate name for rule ie JUNK.

f) Click OK

Creating this JUNK rule will automatically delete emails containing specific words or phrases you entered.

There are many other rules you can apply (ie move certain messages to specific folders automatically), depending on what you need.

Here are a couple of web sites that list phrases and keywords frequently used in spam mail:

http://www.sv-cs.com/spam.html http://www.wilsonweb.com/wmt8/spamfilter_phrases.htm

2. Use anti-spam software.

You can install software either on your computer (client side) or on your web host (server side).

According to FTC website, purpose of this forum was "to address proliferation of unsolicited commercial e-mail and to explore technical, legal, and financial issues associated with it."

While FTC and other government entities try to figure out how they can legally address Spam issue, they are doing so without consulting with those of us who run small businesses online. Of 97 people who spoke at forum, majority was technicians and lawyers who represent ISP's and Anti-Spam companies. A few of people even represented large bulk email companies.

Forum participants could not even agree on a proper definition of "spam" --- yet they propose that they are best qualified to help write laws that will eliminate spam?

My question is this, who represented small business owner and small publishers at FTC spam forum? No one really. It was not because small business segment did not have representatives willing to speak on their behalf. In fact, both I-Cop.org and OMPUAC.org --- both of whom represent small online businesses --- had petitioned to have their representatives speak at forum, but both were turned down.

You can read list of people who DID speak at FTC "Spam Forum" at:

http://www.theezine.net/ftc_spam_forum.shtml

Should you honestly believe anti-spam profiteers had your interests in mind when they had opportunity to speak to FTC?

Here are some of anti-spam profiteers who found representation at FTC "Spam Forum":

· Mail Abuse Prevention System (MAPS) · SpamCon Foundation · SpamCop · The Spamhaus Project · Habeas

Even in hallowed lists of anti-spam zealots, profiteers aren't taken very seriously sometimes. When addressing Anne P. Mitchell, Esq., CEO of Habeas, Inc., a member of SPAM-L list suggested:

"What makes you think that 'we' trust Habeas any more than any other organisation whose business model depends on spam continuing to exist in order to stay in business."

Good point.

William Waggoner, founder of AAW Marketing LLC in Las Vegas, Nevada, did actually support my own point of view. He suggested at "Spam Forum" that technology techniques like spam filtering hurts even legitimate email marketers!

You know whom Mr. Waggoner was talking about. He was talking about those e-mail marketers who have actually acquired permission from email recipient to send them commercial email.

When someone in forum audience laughed at his comment, Waggoner fired back, "You think that's funny?"

So why did they laugh? This gets to heart of why FTC Spam Forum was bad news for legitimate email marketer. Many anti-spam zealots do not believe that there is such a thing as "legitimate commercial email!"